Every manuscript submitted to a journal has to progress through the complete publication cycle before it finally gets published. The publication cycle takes genesis with the research idea. The researchers take this idea to a new horizon by conducting experiments, taking into account the previous publications that deal with similar topic. The research draft is then submitted to a journal that is followed by the assessment, reviewing, and further production processing before being published. Let’s discuss the different phases in detail so that we can get a bird’s eye view of the entire publication process.

How publication cycle works?

After the manuscript is submitted, it is first screened by the Editor-in-chief; if rejected, the paper is returned to the author, and if accepted, it goes to the next level. Here, the paper is checked for plagiarism, and conformity to the journal guidelines. Once the manuscript clears this technical round it is then sent for review by a panel of reviewers, who are subject experts. Here, the reviewers either reject the paper for lack of novelty or other reasons that might be study specific or they could either accept the paper or suggest revisions before acceptance. The paper with revisions is sent to the Editor-in-chief for approval, before being sent for a second and final round of review. At times, the paper gets rejected even after coming this far. If the paper is accepted it then goes through the in-house publication process, before finally getting published.

Some journals forego this time taking and tedious process and instead publish all manuscripts after checking it for novelty, relevance to the field of study and compliance to the style guide of the journal. This ensures a shorter review time and faster publication.

How long can a publication cycle run?

The publication cycle time of a journal cannot be assessed unless and until it is specified by the journal. Hence, it is difficult to know which journals have a fast publication cycle. Some journals take months before they give their first decision whereas some let their first decision known in a couple of weeks. Generally, the time gap between submission and first decision varies between 2-3 weeks.

What if the publication cycle is slow-moving?

The slow decision process becomes mentally tasking for researchers, as they spent many anxious months and even years before they actually get to know if their manuscript has been published or not. If their manuscript does not get published they have to again go through the same process of preparing their manuscript according to the guidelines of a new journal, submit it there and again wait for its decision. This cycle sometimes goes on for a few years before the manuscript gets published. In this process sometimes it so happens that the relevance of the paper or the research gets outdated by the time it is accepted for publication, thereby making the efforts of the researcher futile.

It is for these reasons that the researchers earnestly want a fast publication cycle, where they do not have to wait for so long to get a decision on their manuscript. Also, the publication houses are trying their best to formulate ways to make the publication process faster so that good and relevant researches do not become irrelevant. However, the authors need to be aware of the millions of predatory journals luring them for publishing within a very short duration. The authors are the best person to judge their options and choose the one that helps their research best.

Professional editing services provide a broad spectrum of services such as basic and advanced copy editing, proofreading, and substantive editing. Substantive editing can be opted for by an author when the paper requires in-depth editing, restructuring, and rephrasing, or if the sentences lack clarity. In such cases of high-level editing, professional editors rephrase and rewrite the convoluted and imprecise sentences and paragraphs. This input considerably enhances the presentation of your manuscript and improves the chances of publication. Advanced copyediting is a less rigorous editing process that often encompasses an expanded copyediting service to fix minor errors in your paper. The service also includes rewriting of certain unclear sentences, but the amount of editing remains modest. Basic copyediting entails correction of general grammatical and syntax errors and improving word choice to enhance the manuscript in terms of presentation and clarity. Proofreading involves checking of overall errors in the manuscript including grammar, punctuation marks, capitalization, and better word choice at certain places to improve the quality of the paper. It constitutes the basic level of editing and polishes a manuscript. To avail such professional editing services, one needs to hire an editor who is well-versed with the aforementioned editing categories. The benefits of hiring a professional editor include the following:

Authors who have excellent ideas but find it difficult to express them on paper can gain substantially.

Professional editing services save the author’s time.

The chances of publication of the manuscript are enhanced manifold.

Minor as well as major errors in your manuscript are identified and ironed out.

Authors get acquainted with the general writing conventions, grammar rules, and proper usage of punctuation marks, which helps them avoid convoluted and incorrect sentences in their writing.

Professionally edited manuscripts have an edge in the peer review process.

Although professional editors can polish the manuscript by pointing out gaps in the paper, the onus of the research paper lies on the author. Therefore, a professional editor can ably serve as a helping hand in the publication process, but cannot assure publication of the manuscript. Nonetheless, if the author is able to take note of all suggestions by the editor and provide the necessary information, the paper has a much greater chance of success.

Writing a dissertation is the start of the final phase of graduation. For a student, it marks the transition from being a graduate to a research scholar. Writing a dissertation is a self-directed process, making it an interesting yet challenging task. It is the culmination of years of hard work and study.

However, writing a dissertation is only the first, albeit most important, part in a series of necessary actions that contributes to the final form of a dissertation. After the draft is complete, it is critical to submit it to a professional service provider for a thorough proofreading and editing process to ensure that the text reaches its final, refined, and presentable form.

An apposite editing of a dissertation involves several important steps. Although there is a temptation in this digital age to take recourse to an automated editing process by means of many available software, it is far more reliable to go in for a manual or physical editing service. A professional editor rectifies all inappropriate or incorrect usages with an astute eye on the spelling, punctuation, grammar, and formatting aspects of the dissertation. From this standpoint, a professional dissertation editing service is a crucial step before submitting the dissertation. In the process, there will be plenty of indicators on the quality of the dissertation and its chances of being accepted or rejected.

Here are some essential guidelines for refining your dissertation:

Don’t edit while writing the paper.
Editing the text while writing will not only break the flow of thoughts and words of the text, but it will also break your concentration in detecting any mistakes made. It is better to leave the editing of the text to the post-writing phase.

Self-evaluate your dissertation carefully. Contrary to popular belief, a quick reading of the whole dissertation does not suffice. Conversely, a thorough check on your part will help iron out many basic errors in the dissertation and can serve as the primary stage of editing your paper. This will help the professional editor to better understand your text and improve it further.

Edit your dissertation in sections.Breaking the whole text into sections and sub-sections is a great idea for the self-editing purpose. Editing chunks of the text with proper and timely breaks is more effective than continuously working on the dissertation.

Seek a peer-review.Family and friends, who constitute the most crucial system in your research journey, can be good reviewers of your paper. Sharing your text for a thorough reading might help detect many loopholes.

Hire a professional editor/editing service.A professional editor carries out a careful review of the dissertation to ensure that the thesis is clearly stated and is in accordance with the university guidelines. They would also check the consistency of sentences and flow between paragraphs. This brings greater clarity of the ideas in the text from a reader’s point of view. Often, a professional reader is able to identity many loopholes that a self-assessment or a peer review might miss.

Why Editing Matters?

Why editing matters ? Has this question crossed your mind?How many times have you come across a written piece in a newspaper, magazine, webpage or even a book and wondered where are the editors? It goes without saying that a single typographical error in a reading can hamper the writer’s as well as the publication’s reputation. Though, in this case the editors may not be at fault. Perhaps, the editors had done their best and the error was the result of a misprint. Nevertheless, there’s no denying the fact that errors hamper the flow of any written piece and are a source of discomfit for readers.

The point in this article is not to highlight how even in the best writing we can find scope for editing, but how better editing can bring the best out of any piece of writing.

Some Points on Why Editing Matters?

One of the vital aspects of writing is editing. Many a time editing becomes more effective when it is done by others. Most writers get their work edited by professional editors. This is because there are instances when you may not notice obvious errors in your own writing because you are reading what you are thinking, and not what is written. Writers are so engrossed with their own ideas and creations that they cannot discover even basic errors and typos from their manuscripts. That is why even the best writers have their work verified by professional editors.

So, what’s special about professional editors? Professional editors are trained to notice errors in a document and modify it appropriately to improve it to the acceptable standard. In other words, they have an excellent eye for detail that enables them to detect even the smallest of errors.

A professional editor is also a specialist editor, who alters the structure and content of a piece of writing, as they know what works and what doesn’t. Perhaps, this is the reason why editors are so highly regarded in the world of publishing and considered the real catalysts behind any publications’ success. A professional editor can bring more clarity and readability to a text by rephrasing sentences and reordering words. This makes the reading unambiguous and lucid thus ensuing the smooth flow of ideas offered in the content. In addition, substantive editing done by professional editors eliminates spelling and punctuation mistakes, errors in grammar and syntax, while also improving the style and rhythm of the text.

In recent times, our world has become quite competitive and ambitious. With the rise of competitive industrial markets, efficiently written communication has become more critical than ever. An expressive and concisely prepared business document not only reflects professionalism, but also helps in making an affirmative first impression on the prospective business clients. On the other hand, if a business document comes into view as confusing and unclear and does not successfully communicate the intended message, it can most certainly place your reputation at threat and immediately acquire you a tag of being sloppy and unprofessional. The present article on “Editing and Proofreading Services” provides some basic information about professional editing and proofreading services, and also gives detailed information on why to take the help of these professionals.

Why Use Professional Editing and Proofreading Services

Usually, people fail to notice the importance of professional editing and proofreading services. They actually do not realize the values these professional services can attach to their written documents. Ahead of submitting any written document for publication, it is necessary to make sure that it communicates the intended message in the most understandable way as the business documents are an indication of our principles, as well as standards of our association. Therefore, it is always beneficial to take the help of professional editing and proofreading services before publishing our written documents.

Let’s look upon some points so as to why one should necessarily get the help of professional editing and proofreading services.

Written communications are of major significance. It is vital for a written document to be understandable and to the point. In case, it is not, there lurks a risk of losing a prospective business client since you were either unable to give enough attention to the details, or your document was unsuccessful in impressing the potential customer or financier.

Formerly, companies depended mainly on in-house services for their editing and proofreading requirements. However, because of growing time limitations and competition, companies are now gradually more outsourcing their editing and proofreading requirements to the professional services.

In the business world, terms like ‘editing’ and ‘proofreading’ are regularly used interchangeably. However, these two terms can be distinguished given that they focus on dissimilar features of writing. On one hand, editing focuses on the tone and flow of the manuscript. On the other hand, proofreading seeks to certify the rightness of the manuscript. By taking the help of a professional service provider, you can relax confident that both techniques are applied, use of which comes out with an outstandingly written document.

Business documents are a lot more vulnerable to mistakes as these documents characteristically involve association. Besides, the majority of business writers work under constraint and have to meet fixed targets. Inappropriate tone, repetition in words or facts, grammatical errors and spelling mistakes are some of the frequent mistakes in business writing. Writers habitually get so absorbed in their work that they often fail to observe those mistakes. Hence, the task must be transferred into the skilled hands of a professional editor and/or proofreader.

Concisely, professional editing and proofreading services can manage the written documents in a more efficient manner than in-house services or using word-processing tools. Accordingly, we will get a wholesome professional representation that eventually develops reliance and reverence. This result must not be undervalued by any business. In fact, it may perhaps be what exists between you and the client you should protect.

Proofreading is the last and ultimate step of any editing process. Proofreading focuses on exterior errors, such as spelling mistakes, grammar and punctuation errors, etc. Proofreading should be done when the manuscript is completely written and checked for additional editing modifications. The present article ‘tips on proofreading’ provides some effective tips and strategies to improve the proofreading style of any written paper.

Effective Tips on Proofreading

After working so hard to present your ideas and notions in your paper, nobody would like to make careless errors and mistakes distracting their readers from what they have to tell. Therefore, it’s really necessary to pay attention to the information and devote some time for proofreading the paper to make a lasting impression.

Following tips on proofreading enable you to search analytically for explicit kinds of errors and mistakes in your paper.

Avoid relying completely on spell-checkers. As spell-checkers have a limited glossary, some words may show as misspelled, while in reality, these words won’t be actually present in the spell-checker glossary. Spell-checkers will not detect spelling mistakes that form another suitable word, e.g., ‘your’ instead of ‘you’re’, ‘to’ instead of ‘too’, ‘there’ instead of ‘their’, etc.

Avoid depending on grammar checkers. As grammar checkers work with a limited quantity of rules, they cannot spot every error and mistake. Grammar checkers should be limited to the use of identifying possible continued sentences or repeated use of passive voice.

Avoid spotting and revising several things at once. Try to proofread only one type of error at a time, like checking for grammar mistakes, checking for punctuation errors, and checking for spelling mistakes, should be done individually.

Avoid reading silently or too hurriedly as you may miss out some errors or make unaware alterations. In fact, read gradually and steadily. Read word-by-word. Reading out loud may be helpful as it compels you to say each and every word. It also allows you to listen to the words and decide whether the sentences are making sense.

Read each sentence independently. Look out for punctuation, grammar, or spelling mistakes. Encircle every punctuation mark. This allows you to spot each punctuation mark and decide whether the punctuation is adequate.

Try reading the paper backwards. This might be effective in checking spelling mistakes. As you read each word individually, your focus will be completely on the spelling of each word.

Whoever said this, it is actually right, ‘Ignorance may be bliss, but it won’t make you a better proof-reader’. Often some words and phrases do not seem quite right, but we are not sure about what is wrong either. Spell-checker shows the word to be right, but we are not sure whether it is correct. Should we insert comma between two words, but we are not sure of doing that. Should we use ‘that’ or ‘which’. So, whenever similar confusions arise, it is always safe to look it up.

Proofreading procedure becomes more proficient when you widen and practice a methodical approach. Try to identify the definite parts of your own writing that need careful consideration. Learning to have a reliable technique to find errors and mistakes will assist you to focus more on developing your ideas while preparing the paper.

You most likely already employ some of the tips and strategies discussed above. Try out different procedures and strategies until you find a method that works best for you. Tips on proofreading will help you and guide you to make the proofreading procedure efficient and purposeful. By following the strategies provided in ‘tips on proofreading’, you can learn to check as many errors and mistakes as possible in the smallest amount of time.

First and foremost, we must keep it in our mind that websites are addressed to users rather than readers. In other words, they must provide information in such a way that it is consistent with the nature of their medium, as well as makes full use of the medium’s resources. Digital capabilities are often grouped under the supportive term multimedia. The multimedia includes text, graphics, sound, video and animation. The potential of multimedia is increasingly being recognized and utilized in most areas of communication, like education, entertainment, business, etc. In fact, new fields of communication have emerged through the use of multimedia applications, such as the creative combination of educational, information and entertainment techniques that has come to be known as edutainment and infotainment. The fact that the digital medium is actually a collection of different media capabilities gives the web designer a singular task to coordinate the different media and produce, through their combination, an effective and compelling result. However, the technology for graphics, sound, video and animation is constantly changing. In this regard, a necessity arises to focus more on the text, about which we will discuss in our next blog.

Email is a very swift method of correspondence. Through an email one can send data or information across the world to multiple recipients in a few seconds, at a fraction of the cost of the courier or postal charges. This is a great advantage but can be a drawback too. As once the sent button is hit there can be no recalling of the information sent. Though some software is found which can retrieve a sent email but it is not popular and easily available.

An email can be seen and read simultaneously by many recipients, open to a more constructive criticism and feedback. Another disadvantage of emails is that due to their ease and simplicity, emails often tend to be associated with speech and casual language rather than formal script, which can lead to miscommunication.

When sending email as part of a professional communication, keep in mind these two points:

An email message is a written text; therefore, it is bound by the conventions of writing. The audience and purpose should determine the relative formality of style and the amount of detail. Ease of transmission and deletion does not justify sloppy composition, wrongly spelt words and ungrammatical sentences. A very common complaint with business emails are that writers seem abrupt and disrespectful and seem written in haste.

Email does not replace hard copy. Printed and signed documents are still considered more binding and formal than soft copy. Therefore, it is always better that even when you email a report for fast transmission, make sure to send a hard copy to formalize the communication. Firstly, it is still easier to lose documents in cyberspace. Secondly, there can be technical glitchesâ€™ with electronic communication, whereas print can fall back on the universality and reliability of paper.

The closest hard document to an email message is the memo. Email headers, for instance parallel memo headers, comprising From, To, Subject and Date. Therefore, construct an email message like a memo. This means you should:

Begin with an opening address: This could be ‘Dearâ€™ … … for more formal correspondence or ‘Hello … ‘ for less formal. You can omit an opening address if the message is one in a series of reply exchanges on a topic.

Place your main message as close to beginning as possible: Give as much information possible in the first paragraph. All details must be given in following paragraphs.

Write in full words and paragraphs.

Never use uppercase to emphasize anything, its better to italicize the word.

End the mail by clear stating the expected response by the person after reading the email.

Sign your message with your name and affiliation and contact number.

Other points to be kept in mind while writing an official mail are keep short paragraphs while writing emails. Do not use headings, tables or formatted text in the body of the email. If there is large data then include those in attachments and not in the body of the email.

Use of email is appropriate in cases where even their deletion will not cause any problems. They can be used instead of letters in case of external communication and memos in case of internal communication. It is always better to get a hard copy for binding contracts or information that needs to be recorded.

We can read printed documents much easily than electronic ones. Reading online increases reading time by about 25%. This is because the visual resolution of a printed material is about 250 times sharper than the computer screen.

Print media offers more portability. We can read a book/newspaper/magazine anywhere without the hassle of hardware.

Print materials are faster to skim through. They can also be easily shuffled compared to online pages.

It is easier to underline or highlight something on paper.

Strengths of Electronic Writing

Generally, online publishing is more cost effective than print publishing.

Online publishing provides more scope for experimenting with style and space.

It is much easier to edit or update online content. It can be done with just a few clicks. In print media, for updating any information, the whole thing needs to be reprinted, which increases expenditure.

The use of multimedia helps to present online materials in a much more pleasing and entertaining manner.

Electronic writing offers more interactivity. For example, in surveys, people respond more readily to online requests.

In our day-to-day life, we often confuse the Internet with the World Wide Web. However, they both differ to some extent. The internet includes the web, as well as it is the infrastructure level of the medium, including services such as email, etc. On the other hand, the web is the public face of the internet medium, where users access information about products and services by visiting their respective websites.

It is quite necessary to remember that the internet is just a medium and not a document type. It provides the means of transmission and exchange of information presented in different document types. For example, we can’t sent a report via email as an attachment, or post it as a portable document format (pdf) on a site. The document would still be a report, regardless of its medium of transmission. In other words, while composing it, we should follow the conventions and expectations of report writing. Microsoft word, for instance, creates documents that are generally intended to be read in printed form or hard copy, even though they have been created and maybe even sent in a digital medium.